I Am Responsible For Myself

"I am responsible for my own feelings" goes the adage that many young and emotional school children hear from worried parents who observe their breakdowns.

And so it is true on such a basic level that it is a primary building block lesson for our children.

I am responsible for myself.

I am responsible for my behavior.

I am responsible for my future.

I am responsible for my freedom.

I have decided that this is true for myself. If I wished, I could try and delegate responsibility for my life to somebody who would accept it. But nobody can delegate responsibility for their life to me unless I allow it.

In short, I am not responsible for you, nor you for me, unless you and I agree on the situation.

Be very careful giving anyone responsibility over your own life because with responsibility comes power -- it must necessarily be so, for those who bear the consequences of others' actions must be empowered with the ability to shape what those actions are (or bear the unlimited risk of consequences they cannot control).

Be especially wary about delegating responsibility for your life to somebody who is excited to bear it, who urges you to give it. This is the state of affairs in our government, the leaders of which do not bear the consequences for the actions of those over whose lives they are given responsibility for -- while in this case everyone has thrust upon them responsibility for the eagerly governed, power is concentrated... power over the lives of those souls who delegate the responsibility for their lives to the government. The provider, the benefactor upon whom so many rely, becomes a sort of leader, a hero. And he offers (foists, really) his help to --and, implicitly, to take and then to punt responsibility for -- more and more people.

But something gets lost in the mix -- different responsibilities for different sects of a persons life are not easily separated. A leader given responsibility for the livelihood of a person hasn't only taken control of their stomach but also their speech. Responsibility is necessarily tied to freedom.

In the 1930s:

The government took responsibility for freedom of savings and retirement accounts.

They took responsibility for freedom of farm production.

They took responsibility for freedom of industrial output.

They took responsibility for freedom of the banking system.

They took responsibility for freedom of the flow of capital.

They took responsibility for freedom of the welfare of the poor.

They took responsibility for freedom of wages.

They took responsibility for freedom of Supreme Court rulings.

They took responsibility for freedom of housing form and quantity.

Do you admire our government although it eagerly offers to take responsibility for your life? Obama, he who has been ceded responsibility for so many people since he sits atop the US Government, reaps the power of responsibility but not its consequences, which are foisted upon Americans everywhere. Do you trust Obama even as he pleads with Americans to let him use the power of government for their own benefit?

--Obama murders children across the world.

--He is guilty of a wide variety of war crimes.

--Obama claims the power to indefinitely detain, or kill, Americans without charge or trial.

--Obama's oversight has resulted in a cavalcade of new regulations written without the involvement of the representatives of the people.

--Obama arrests people and throws them in jail for what they put in their own bodies or grow in their own yards.

--Obama says it's illegal for you to voluntarily agree to certain contracts with insurers.

--Obama believes it's moral and constitutional to mandate that you buy a private product.

--Obama has nationalized the auto industry and stolen from private bondholders.

--Obama has refused to submit to subpoenas.

--Obama has presided over a justice department that purports to strong arm courts in to throwing Americans in jail by claiming national security secrecy powers and refusing to allow the accused to confront their charges or the court to hear the evidence against the accused.

--Obama claims the power to spy on all of Americans' communications without warrant.

Do you trust Obama, the eager leader, self-proclaimed helper who hides under the banner of democracy?

Yea, many Americans hero-ize him, place responsibility in his hands, implore him, wait with bated breath to be directed.

Here's the question:

Would you trust Obama with responsibility for your life?

It's the same question as:

Would you give Obama your freedom, that inalienable thing which is endowed by your creator and which is only yours to give?

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"[Freedom is] not entitlement. An entitlement is what people on welfare get, and how free are they? It's not an endlessly expanding list of rights — the "right" to education, the "right" to food and housing. That's not freedom, that's dependency. Those aren't rights, those are the rations of slavery — hay and a barn for human cattle.There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -- P.J. O'Rourke

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Meet The Blogger

C M Snyder

IIT produced engineer with the ambition to develop property in Chicago and help return some of the Chicago sense of place to areas of the city that are losing it. Investors and engineers solve problems for a living, so I offer my strong opinions on what these are and how they might be solved.